2023 America Votes State Summit: Resiliency, Accountability, Community
Written by Ashley Mumm (she/her), Communications Director at APANO & APANO Communities United Fund
Pictured (from left to right): Rosario Rucoba, Latino Network Action Fund; Marchel Marcos, APANO; Will Miller, NAYA; Douglas Emhoff, Second Gentleman of the United States; Ashley Mumm, APANO; Sushmita Poddar, community leader and advocate.
Resiliency, accountability, community. Those words may seem like just buzzwords — gobbledygook, if you will — but I don’t think of them that way. In the last few years, we’ve witnessed drastic shifts in our collective consciousness and what it means to be alive today. At the end of the day, we all want the same things: safety, security, a place to call home and people to love and call it home with.
Photo credit: Thien Vo, APANO
For me, fear cannot be the reason I do the things. Fear-mongering is a tired, albeit effective, tactic of the right. Fear cannot stop me from hoping, wishing, and striving for what may seem like the impossible. Because even being successful in that improbability just once is enough of a motivator for me.
I try to carry that mentality with me in my work. Fighting for social, economic, and racial justice is a difficult, heart-wrenching task — especially when the people elected to act in your best interests don’t show up for work. Challenging the status quo can be scary, but that is the way forward. With liberation for those most oppressed and marginalized, we have the ability to lift all boats. There is no loss when we address and tend to the most dire needs in our communities.
I joined APANO Communities United Fund (CUF) in September of 2022 and immediately jumped head-first into the partnerships that span both APANO CUF and APANO, our 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) affiliates, respectively. It was and continues to be an exciting whirlwind! Just a few months in, I had the opportunity to gather with some of our partners in D.C for the America Votes State Summit, “a mainstay in progressive organizing.” We joined fellow state and national experts “for two days of strategizing, networking and energizing for the road ahead,” and it delivered.
My first time back since an eighth grade field trip, D.C. was even more grand than I remembered. (The weather was certainly a welcome change from Oregon’s neverending winter.) I saw monuments and nods to our past with new eyes. Thinking about how the District and our country itself were constructed, I was heartened to know we were gathering to address the inequities our institutions were founded on and that continue to negatively impact most Americans. Below are a few of the key themes and takeaways for me:
Pictured (from left to right): Ashley Mumm, APANO; Rosario Rucoba, Latino Network Action Fund; Will Miller, NAYA; Marchel Marcos, APANO; Thien Vo, APANO.
Investing in us — our people — is how we grow our economy in a just and equitable way. Trickle-down economics truly did not trickle down. Directly investing in us is the way.
A win for progressive policies is a win for everyone. (OK, nearly everyone. The ultra-wealthy will see it as a loss, because their precious hoard will be slightly, marginally smaller. If we maintain our current capitalist society, they will still win and still be exorbitantly, ridiculously wealthy.)
Getting out the vote is a long-term process. Just like courtship, moving hearts and minds is a long game. Centering ourselves in our shared aforementioned goals, we can shift the narrative around what it means to be American and what it means to be successful here.
State elections matter. A lot. Really, they all matter, from electing your local school board to passing county-and state-specific legislation. Every election has a compounding effect, and we need representation in every area.
2024 will be here before we know it. And we need to stay engaged, connected and ever-prepared for what comes next.
2023’s challenges are providing guidance for 2024. We must empower and recognize ourselves as the heroes in our own story.
Elections are mysterious, seemingly nefarious things. And there are a handful of people who want them to stay just that so as to limit who can vote and who can hold positions of power. But they don’t have to be! We can clarify election processes and encourage our communities to get involved. Hope can and should be contagious.
There is work to be done. We are winning and losing elections by the margins, and issues are not always partisan. We can use information from past wins and losses to influence our future actions.
Facism is a real threat. (See: Florida.) We don’t get to negotiate about whether or not this is a battle, for a lack of a better word. We must continue to resist and persist, coming together to be a formidable force for good.
Hold all the feet to the fire. Corporations, and the elected officials who are bought and paid for by them, need to be reminded of our collective power.
We can have what feel like opposing ideologies. We can want both safety and reform to our penal system, corporal punishment, and policing. And, we get to decide what safety means to us. We must take a step back and lean into our values, letting that guide the legislation we support and the candidates we elect.
Last but not least, take time and make space to plan. This work can feel too fast-paced, and there is always more work than there is time to do it. We must make time for strategic planning and rest. We cannot burn ourselves out.
It was a lot of information to glean in just a few days, but getting to relive it here has been so encouraging! I hope you too, dear reader, feel empowered to take action. I truly believe we can create an existence where everyone can thrive.
Until next time, America Votes.
With love,
Ashley